Luckily I kept the fact that my suitcase was slightly -over- the weight limit on the way here in mind and only bought a small Christmas present for my mother and a small but cool stone called a shiva linga, which is a stone gathered in a special yearly ceremony from the Namada River.

Less than two miles away, the Orthodox Jewish family of the 8-year-old boy who got lost on his first walk home from a religious day camp and encountered Aron began a week-long mourning ritual known as "shiva."

“My main character is a Jewish cantor and he makes a home for his ex-wife in his guest room after he’s widowed from his second wife and the first wife gets a skull fracture while he’s sitting shiva, which is when people come to pay their respects.”